The subject matter of the present invention relates generally to apparatus for splitting rolls of sheet material, and in particular to a sheet roll splitter having a horizontal cutter which moves radially inward to cut the roll and horizontal holding arms for holding the roll during cutting. The present invention is especially useful for splitting rolls of paper into separate sheets which may then be fed to the chemical pulpers to turn the paper back into pulp, for reuse in the paper making process. The paper rolls which are so split are actually the unused remnants of larger rolls of greater length which are cut into a plurality of smaller rolls of different sizes determined by customer's orders. Thus, these remnant rolls, which are in effect waste paper, vary in length and diameter.
Previously, the sheet rolls have been split by vertical guillotine type cutters mounted on a stationary frame, after moving the rolls from the floor up onto such frame, as shown in U.S. Pat. No. 2,804,140 of Van Riper, issued Aug. 27, 1957 and U.S. Pat. No. 3,675,525 of Ellison, issued July 11, 1972. These vertical guillotine type roll splitters are large, permanently mounted installations which take up a lot of room and require that the heavy paper rolls be transported from the paper making machine to the cutter, which is difficult and time consuming. In addition, some of these roll splitters require that the roll be lifted vertically into position to be cut, which requires special equipment. Furthermore, vertical guillotine type cutters are dangerous since they can inadvertently fall by gravity and cut the operator, in the event of a mechanical or electrical failure. This hazard is eliminated using the horizontal cutter apparatus of the present invention.
Other safety hazards are eliminated using the present roll splitter, including those associated with manual splitting of rolls by axes, power saws, and knives. Power saws also create paper dust which is a health hazard and requires the use of a cumbersome respirator. In addition, the present invention is a mobile roll splitter which can be moved to the paper making machine being operated for splitting remnant rolls produced on such machine. Then the paper sheets from the split roll may be returned to the pulper supplying such machine to provide additional pulp of the same grade and color as the paper sheet being formed on such machine. Of course, this is not true of the vertical guillotine type roll splitters, which are mounted on a stationary frame away from the paper making machines so that the split roll sheets must be sorted in grade and color before sending them to the pulpers supplying such machines.
It has previously been proposed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,605,542 of Smith et al, issued Sept. 20, 1971, to provide a roll splitter which moves the cutter blade horizontally. However, unlike the present invention, the cutter of this apparatus moves longitudinally of the paper roll with a plow like motion during cutting and does not move radially inward towards the core during cutting. In addition, such apparatus employs a counter weighted mechanism for lifting the paper roll into position to be cut. As a result, such prior apparatus is considerably more complicated and requires more floor space for operation than the roll splitter apparatus of the present invention. In addition, such prior apparatus is not mobile but is fixedly mounted over the repulping machine, so that it has many of the disadvantages of the previously described vertical guillotine type apparatus.